The Sufi Gospel project – Sonam Kalra

The Sufi Gospel Project is an effort to blend all the voices of faith, through the use of song, music and the spoken word. Traditional western gospel melds with Indian classical sounds, and Indian spiritual texts are enriched by elements of western poetry to create a sound that touches every soul. Revealing that no matter what the language of the lyrics, or the ethnicity of the sounds, there is but one language, the language of faith. And that is the universal truth.
Khusrau blends with Amazing Grace, Kabir shares the stage with Abide with Me and Bulleh Shah’s voice is heard amidst English and Gaelic texts.
Owing to her versatility, Sonam is fast becoming a familiar voice at prestigious venues and festivals. Recently, Sonam performed at Muzaffar Ali’s Jahan-e-Khusrau World Sufi Festival, where she sang at the finale, immediately before the legendary Abida Parveen. The following week she sang at a fund-raiser for the Indian Head Injury Foundation for an audience including Sting and at the residence of the Chief Minister of Rajasthan, where she and her musicians collaborated with a group of 60 Manganiyar musicians from Rajasthan.
Sonam recently performed in a series of very successful concerts in London where she sang at the residence of the Indian High Commissioner, at the Nehru Centre, The Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan and for the Lily Foundation charity.
Most recently, Sonam and the Sufi Gospel Project have filmed a song for “Coke Studio” on MTV. Some of the festivals she has been invited to include Kalaa Utsavam in Singapore, The India Show in Toronto, the Delhi International Arts Festival, the Bengaluru International Arts Festival, The World Sufi Spirit Festival in Nagaur, the Rajasthan International Folk Festival, Jodhpur and several others. Among other venues, Sonam has sung at the French and Italian Embassies, the British High Commission and at the American Embassy to welcome the new Ambassador to India, Ms Nancy Powell. She has performed at the NCPA (Mumbai), the Weaver’s Collective and Anantara (Kolkata), TEDx Talks (New Delhi and Rourkela), Blue Frog (Delhi and Mumbai), Chowdiah Hall (Bengaluru), JT-PAC (Kochi), Neemrana Fort Palace, at Rajiv Gandhi’s Samadhi on his birth anniversary in front of the President, Vice-President, Prime Minister, the Union cabinet, members of the Gandhi family and many others and in cities as diverse as Srinagar, Cochin, Ahmedabad, Chandigarh, Jaipur and Kasauli. Earlier this
year she sang at a concert for peace to commemorate the European Union being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for 2012. Sonam will make her debut on Coke Studio on MTV in October 2013.